Toronto’s red hot real-estate market has helped deliver an unexpected boost to the city’s bottom line. The city will officially announce its year-end fiscals on Monday and it’s expected the surplus will be about $290 million, which is roughly double the $140-million surplus expected.

Coun. Denzil Minnan-Wong spoke to CBC News on Saturday and said much of the extra money comes from the land transfer tax, which is generating extra revenue as Toronto's real-estate market continues to surge.

Minnan-Wong cautioned that although he opposed the land transfer tax in the past, it might be too soon for the city to consider removing it.

“We have a quite a substantial debt,” he said. “The last administration spent $700 million for streetcars and didn’t have a way to pay for it. Until we have some way to pay for those large expenditures, it’s hard to make an argument to eliminate the land transfer tax."

The land transfer tax charges purchasers on a sliding scale base on the value of the property. A house priced at $500,000 would result in $5,700 in land transfer taxes.